Some implementations herein relate to a graphical user interface (GUI) that facilitates dynamically partitioning agricultural fields into clusters on an individual agricultural field-basis using agricultural features. A map of a geographic area containing a plurality of agricultural fields may be rendered as part of a GUI. The agricultural fields may be partitioned into a first set of clusters based on a first granularity value and agricultural features of individual agricultural fields. The individual agricultural fields may be visually annotated in the GUI to convey the first set of clusters of similar agricultural fields. Upon receipt of a second granularity value different from the first granularity value, the agricultural fields may be partitioned into a second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields. The map of the geographic area may be updated so that individual agricultural fields are visually annotated to convey the second set of clusters.
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1. A method implemented using one or more processors, comprising:
rendering, as part of a graphical user interface (GUI), a map of a geographic area containing a plurality of agricultural fields,
wherein the plurality of agricultural fields are visually annotated on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey a first set of clusters of similar agricultural fields, and
wherein the plurality of agricultural fields are partitioned into the first set of clusters based on a first granularity value and agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields;
receiving user input that indicates a second granularity value that is different than the first granularity value;
based on the second granularity value and the agricultural features, partitioning the plurality of agricultural fields into a second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields,
wherein a count of the second set of clusters is different than a count of the first set of clusters;
performing principal component analysis (PCA) on the agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields to determine one or more agricultural features that were most influential for partitioning individual agricultural fields into a given cluster of the second set of clusters;
generating an additional visual annotation for the given cluster of the second set of clusters, wherein the additional visual annotation conveys one or more of the agricultural features that were most influential for partitioning individual agricultural fields into the given cluster; and
rendering, as part of the GUI, an updated map of the geographic area in which the plurality of agricultural fields are visually annotated on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey the second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields, wherein the given cluster of the second set of clusters is interactive to present the additional visual annotation about agricultural features shared among agricultural fields of the given cluster.
18. A non-transitory computer-readable medium comprising instructions that, in response to execution of the instructions by a processor, cause the processor to:
cause to be rendered, as part of a graphical user interface (GUI), a map of a geographic area containing a plurality of agricultural fields,
wherein the plurality of agricultural fields are visually annotated on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey a first set of clusters of similar agricultural fields, and
wherein the plurality of agricultural fields are partitioned into the first set of clusters based on a first granularity value and agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields;
receive user input that indicates a second granularity value that is different than the first granularity value;
based on the second granularity value and the agricultural features, partition the plurality of agricultural fields into a second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields,
wherein a count of the second set of clusters is different than a count of the first set of clusters;
perform principal component analysis (PCA) on the agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields to determine one or more agricultural features that were most influential for partitioning individual agricultural fields into a given cluster of the second set of clusters;
generate an additional visual annotation for the given cluster of the second set of clusters, wherein the additional visual annotation conveys one or more of the agricultural features that were most influential for partitioning individual agricultural fields into the given cluster; and
cause to be rendered, as part of the GUI, an updated map of the geographic area in which the plurality of agricultural fields are visually annotated on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey the second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields, wherein the given cluster of the second set of clusters is interactive to present the additional visual annotation about agricultural features shared among agricultural fields of the given cluster.
10. A system comprising one or more processors and memory storing instructions that, in response to execution of the instructions by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to:
cause to be rendered, as part of a graphical user interface (GUI), a map of a geographic area containing a plurality of agricultural fields,
wherein the plurality of agricultural fields are visually annotated on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey a first set of clusters of similar agricultural fields, and
wherein the plurality of agricultural fields are partitioned into the first set of clusters based on a first granularity value and agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields;
receive user input that indicates a second granularity value that is different than the first granularity value;
based on the second granularity value and the agricultural features, partition the plurality of agricultural fields into a second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields,
wherein a count of the second set of clusters is different than a count of the first set of clusters;
perform principal component analysis (PCA) on the agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields to determine one or more agricultural features that were most influential for partitioning individual agricultural fields into a given cluster of the second set of clusters;
generate an additional visual annotation for the given cluster of the second set of clusters, wherein the additional visual annotation conveys one or more of the agricultural features that were most influential for partitioning individual agricultural fields into the given cluster; and
cause to be rendered, as part of the GUI, an updated map of the geographic area in which the plurality of agricultural fields are visually annotated on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey the second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields, wherein the given cluster of the second set of clusters is interactive to present the additional visual annotation about agricultural features shared among agricultural fields of the given cluster.
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Agricultural entities such as individual farmers, agricultural cooperatives, and agricultural companies may periodically investigate farmland for a variety of purposes. For example, a farmer may wish to determine whether a particular crop field is a good candidate for expansion (e.g., acquisition, leasing, etc.). However, this can be a daunting task. There may be countless crop fields available, each with its own unique characteristics and/or history of stewardship. Moreover, a particular crop field's suitability to grow a particular variety of a crop—which may be manifested as an expected crop yield in some cases—is dependent on myriad factors. These factors may include, but not limited to, climate, soil composition, prevalence of plant disease (e.g., pests, fungus) and/or weeds in the area, and so forth. Farmland may be investigated for other purposes as well. For example, farmland valuation and/or crop insurance evaluation may involve quantifying risk of crop loss due to factors such as flood, drought, etc.
Agro-ecological zones (AEZs) are geographical areas with similar climatic and/or edaphic characteristics that convey the ability of those AEZs to support various types of crops. Each AEZ may have a similar combination of constraints and potential for land use, and therefore, each AEZ can serve as a focus for the targeting of recommendations designed to improve use of that land, either through increasing production or by limiting land degradation. AEZs may also be used for crop valuation and/or insurance. Conventional AEZs are partitioned based at least in part on factors unrelated to agriculture, such as between geopolitical boundaries such as state lines, county lines, etc. Moreover, conventional AEZs are partitioned at a relatively coarse level. Consequently, there may be individual agricultural fields within an AEZ that do not exhibit the combination of constraints and/or potential for land use attributed to the AEZ as a whole.
Various implementations described herein relate to providing a graphical user interface (GUI) that facilitates dynamic partitioning of a plurality of agricultural fields into clusters or zones on an individual agricultural field-basis using climatic, edaphic, and/or landform features. These clusters or zones may be used for similar purposes as AEZs, and may therefore may be referred to herein as “custom AEZs.” However, these clusters may be partitioned more granularly than traditional AEZs using clustering techniques such as K-means clustering. Moreover, the partitioning may be primarily or exclusively based on agriculturally-relevant features as opposed to geo-political features. Consequently, individual agricultural fields in a given custom AEZ may be more similar to each other in purely agricultural terms than individual agricultural fields in a traditional AEZ. Generating and presenting these clusters dynamically as part of a GUI enables the user to easily compare large numbers of individual agricultural fields for purposes such as land management, crop rotation, agricultural planning, measuring and/or managing risk in association with insurance, etc.
In some implementations, a plurality of agricultural fields may be partitioned into clusters based on a granularity value that influences how many different clusters are generated. For example, K-means clustering may be implemented to partition individual agricultural fields into clusters. Adjusting the K-value dictates how many clusters are created, and hence, the granularity of similarity between individual agricultural fields within each cluster. Accordingly, a K-value is one example of a granularity value that can be adjusted in order to select how granularly individual agricultural fields are partitioned into clusters. K-means clustering is just one example of a technique that can be used with implementations described herein for partitioning individual agricultural fields into clusters. Various other techniques are also contemplated, including but not limited to K-median clustering, mean-shift clustering, density-based spatial clustering of applications with noise (DBSCAN), expectation-maximization (EM) clustering using Gaussian mixture models (GMM), agglomerated hierarchical clustering, and so forth.
In many implementations, custom AEZs partitioned using techniques described here may be presented visually as part of a GUI. Such a GUI may enable a user to view an overhead map of a geographic area that includes a plurality of agricultural fields. The agricultural fields may be visually annotated, e.g., using color(s), shading, text, etc., to convey those custom AEZs to which the agricultural fields belong. Additionally, the user may be able to adjust the granularity value—which in many cases is the number of clusters to be created such as the K-value—in order to create more or less clusters with individual agricultural fields that are more or less similar to each other. For example, in some implementations, the user can operate a GUI element such as a slider bar to cause individual agricultural fields to be re-partitioned in accordance with the new granularity value.
In some implementations, additional annotations may be applied to custom AEZs to convey additional information beyond similarity between constituent agricultural fields of the AEZs. For example, in some implementations, a visual annotation for a given cluster of similar agricultural fields may be generated to convey feature(s) that were most (or least, if desired) influential for assigning the individual agricultural fields to the given cluster. These influential features may be helpful for the user to make decisions related to the agricultural fields in the cluster, such as how to cultivate a field, how to rotate crops in a field, how a field and/or crops to be grown thereon should be valued and/or insured, and so forth. For example, fields that are conveyed as being very similar to each other using techniques described herein may be valued and/or insured by a user at similar rates, as opposed to being valued and/or insured based primarily on those fields' locations relative to one or more geo-political boundaries.
In some implementations, the additional visual annotation may take the form of one or more histograms of features that make readily apparent which features are most influential. Additionally or alternatively, in some implementations in which clusters of individual agricultural fields are partitioned hierarchically, a decision tree may be fitted to the hierarchy of clusters, and the visual annotation for a given cluster may be determined using a path through the decision tree. In some such implementations, ranges, thresholds, and/or other statistical data generated by traversing the path through the decision tree may be mapped to semantically-meaningful words or phrases in order to provide a more intuitive interface for a user. In some cases these semantically-meaningful words or phrases may be similar to those used with traditional AEZs, such as “cold,” “temperate,” “hot,” “dry,” etc.
In some implementations, data engineering and/or preprocessing may be performed on agricultural features associated with individual agricultural fields in order to generate more meaningful and/or useful clusters. For example, any number of temporal features (e.g., represented as time-series data) such as rainfall over time, temperature over time, soil composition over time, etc., may be aggregated. To the extent value(s) are missing from any of these features, in some implementations, those values may be imputed, e.g., using a mean of available values for the feature.
In some implementations, the features/values may then be normalized to bring them to a similar scale. Weights may be selectively applied to some features in order to ensure that relatively sparse features are sufficiently considered. For example, there may be dozens of different climatic features available but a relatively small (or sparse) number of edaphic features, and yet the sparse edaphic features may be just as influential as the climatic features in determining how to manage a field. Accordingly, the relatively sparse edaphic features may be weighted relatively heavily compared to the climatic feature(s). Then, principal component analysis (PCA) may be applied to extract some number (e.g., fifteen) of principal components that account for the bulk of variance between agricultural fields.
In various implementations, a method may be implemented using one or more processors and may include: rendering, as part of a graphical user interface (GUI), a map of a geographic area containing a plurality of agricultural fields, wherein the plurality of agricultural fields are visually annotated on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey a first set of clusters of similar agricultural fields, and wherein the plurality of agricultural fields are partitioned into the first set of clusters based on a first granularity value and agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields; receiving user input that indicates a second granularity value that is different than the first granularity value; based on the second granularity value and the agricultural features, partitioning the plurality of agricultural fields into a second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields, wherein a count of the second set of clusters is different than a count of the first set of clusters; and rendering, as part of the GUI, an updated map of the geographic area in which the plurality of agricultural fields are visually annotated on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey the second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields, wherein a given cluster of the second set of clusters is interactive to present an additional annotation about agricultural features shared among agricultural fields of the given cluster.
In various implementations, the method may include generating the additional visual annotation for a given cluster of the second set of clusters, wherein the additional visual annotation conveys one or more of the agricultural features that were most influential for partitioning the individual agricultural fields into the given cluster. In various implementations, the additional visual annotation may be a histogram of features. In various implementations, the second set of clusters comprises a hierarchy of clusters. In various implementations, the method may further include fitting a decision tree to the hierarchy of clusters. In various implementations, the additional visual annotation for the given cluster may be generated based on a path through the decision tree.
In various implementations, the partitioning may include performing K-means clustering, the first granularity value comprises a first K value, and the second granularity value comprises a second K value. In various implementations, the agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields used to perform the partitioning may include one or more landform properties. In various implementations, the agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields used to perform the partitioning include one or more edaphic features. In various implementations, the agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields used to perform the partitioning include a measure of evapotranspiration.
In addition, some implementations include one or more processors (e.g., central processing unit(s) (CPU(s)), graphics processing unit(s) (GPU(s), and/or tensor processing unit(s) (TPU(s)) of one or more computing devices, where the one or more processors are operable to execute instructions stored in associated memory, and where the instructions are configured to cause performance of any of the aforementioned methods. Some implementations also include one or more non-transitory computer readable storage media storing computer instructions executable by one or more processors to perform any of the aforementioned methods.
It should be appreciated that all combinations of the foregoing concepts and additional concepts described in greater detail herein are contemplated as being part of the subject matter disclosed herein. For example, all combinations of claimed subject matter appearing at the end of this disclosure are contemplated as being part of the subject matter disclosed herein.
An individual (which in the current context may also be referred to as a “user”) associated with an agricultural entity may operate one or more client devices 1061-N to interact with other components depicted in
Farmland knowledge system 104 is an example of an information system in which the techniques described herein may be implemented. Each of client devices 106 and farmland knowledge system 104 may include one or more memories for storage of data and software applications, one or more processors for accessing data and executing applications, and other components that facilitate communication over a network. The operations performed by client device 106 and/or farmland knowledge system 104 may be distributed across multiple computer systems.
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Each client device 106 may operate a variety of different applications that may be used to perform various agricultural tasks, such as crop yield prediction and diagnosis, field searching, field-level crop management, plant-level phenotyping, partitioning of agricultural fields into clusters as described herein, etc. For example, first client device 1061 operates agricultural management software (AMS) 107 (e.g., which may be standalone or part of another application, such as part of a web browser). Other client devices 106 may operate similar applications.
In various implementations, farmland knowledge system 104 may be implemented across one or more computing systems that may be referred to as the “cloud.” Farmland knowledge system 104 may include various components that, alone or in combination, perform selected aspects of the present disclosure. For example, in
Data gathering module 120 may be configured to gather, collect, request, obtain, and/or retrieve raw agricultural data from a variety of different sources, such as agricultural personnel, robot(s), aerial drones, satellite imagery, and so forth. Data gathering module 120 may store that raw agricultural data in raw agricultural data index 122. This agricultural data may be associated with individual agricultural fields, and may include various types of information (i.e. “features”) about each agricultural field, such as climate features, edaphic features, landform features, and so forth. Climate features may include, for instance, precipitation levels/frequencies, temperatures, sunlight exposure, wind, humidity, plant disease, evapotranspiration (the sum of evaporation from the land surface plus transpiration from plants), and so forth. Edaphic features may include various information about soil, such as soil composition, soil pH, soil moisture, fraction data, soil organic carbon content, etc. Landform features may include, for instance, elevation, slope, distance to water, etc. In general, any type of data that has any influence on crop growth in an agricultural field (“agriculturally relevant”) may be gathered by data gathering module 120 and stored in index 122.
The data stored in index 122 by data gathering module 120 may be raw agricultural data that is largely heterogeneous, and therefore, may not necessarily be in a suitable form for partitioning into clusters using techniques described herein. Accordingly, preprocessing module 124 may be configured to process raw data from index 122 and generate preprocessed data for storage in index 126. Preprocessed data may be normalized and/or missing values may be imputed. For example, climate features may be sampled at a higher frequency than, for instance, landform features, and therefore, preprocessing module 124 may impute missing landform features in order that dimensions of climate features and landform features correspond to each other. In some cases, preprocessing module 124 may perform techniques such as principal component analysis (PCA) to determine the most influential components/agricultural features on each agricultural field's membership in a cluster. One non-limiting example of how preprocessing module 124 may preprocess raw data from index 122 is depicted in
Partition module 128 may be configured to analyze preprocessed data from index 126 in order to partition a plurality of agricultural fields into clusters of similar agricultural fields. These clusters are also referred to herein as “custom AEZs.” In various implementations, partition module 128 may perform the partitioning in accordance with a granularity value that dictates how finely/coarsely agricultural fields should be clustered. In some implementations, the granularity value may correspond to a count or number of clusters that are generated. Partition module 128 may perform the partitioning based on the granularity value and on agricultural features of individual agricultural fields of the plurality of agricultural fields.
The granularity value may be manually selected by a user, as will be illustrated in subsequent figures, and/or may be set automatically based on a variety of signals, such as a zoom level being used to view overhead imagery of agricultural fields. Various techniques may be employed to partition the plurality of agricultural fields into clusters, including but not limited to K-means clustering, K-median clustering, mean-shift clustering, density-based spatial clustering of applications with noise (DBSCAN), expectation-maximization (EM) clustering using Gaussian mixture models (GMM), and/or agglomerated hierarchical clustering, to name a few.
UI module 130 may provide an interface through which applications such as AMS 107 may interface with farmland knowledge system 104 in order to implement selected aspects of the present disclosure. As one non-limiting example, UI module 130 may generate and/or distribute scripts, executable files, and/or interactive documents written in markup languages such as hypertext markup language (HTML) and/or extensible markup language (XML) (e.g., “web pages”). A user associated with an agricultural entity may operate an application on a client device 106 such as a web browser (not depicted) or AMS 107 to interact with these items. Additionally or alternatively, in some implementations, UI module 130 may provide an application programming interface (API) to which AMS 107 may connect. In some such implementations, AMS 107 may render its own GUI based on data exchanged with UI module 130.
UI module 130 may be configured to render, or cause a client device 106 to render, as part of a GUI, a map of a geographic area containing the plurality of agricultural fields under consideration. In some implementations, the map rendered/provided by UI module 130 may take the form of satellite imagery that depicts the geographic area from a high elevation. In other implementations the map of the geographic area may be rendered using raster (bitmap) or vector graphics. In either case, UI module 130 may annotate the plurality of agricultural fields visually on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey the set of clusters of similar agricultural fields. For example, all agricultural fields that are members of a given cluster of similar agricultural fields may be colored or pattern-filled uniformly.
In various implementations, a user may operate a client device 106 (e.g., via AMS 107) to provide user input that indicates a desired granularity value that may be, for instance, different than a current granularity value that was used by UI module 130 and/or AMS 107 to render clusters of similar agricultural fields. In some implementations, UI module 130 may provide this new granularity to partition module 128. Based on this new granularity value, and based on the agricultural features of the plurality of fields, partition module 128 may partition the plurality of agricultural fields into a new set of clusters of similar agricultural fields. Because the granularity value was changed, a count of the new set of clusters will be different than a count of the original set of clusters presented to the user previously. UI module 130 may then render, as part of the GUI, an updated map of the geographic area in which the plurality of agricultural fields are visually annotated on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey the new set of clusters of similar agricultural fields. In other implementations, one or more operations described herein as being performed by partition module 128 and/or by UI module 130 may be performed in whole or in part on client device 106, e.g., by AMS 107.
Viewer 240 currently is rendering an overhead view of a geographic region that includes numerous individual agricultural fields (demarcated by the polygons of various shapes) and a body of water 244. While the agricultural fields are largely rectangular, this is not meant to be limiting, and agricultural fields can (and often do) take any geometric shape, including any polygon shape, ovular, circular, triangular, etc. In
In some implementations, AMS 107 and/or UI module 130 may be configured to generate and present additional visual annotations in association with clusters of similar agricultural fields, in addition to or instead of the colors or fill patterns described previously. For example, a user may wish to understand why agricultural fields belong to one cluster instead of another, or what agricultural features were most influential in a particular agricultural field being partitioned into a particular cluster. The additional visual annotation(s) therefore may be generated to convey one or more of the agricultural features that were most influential (or least influential if desired) for partitioning individual agricultural fields into a given cluster.
These additional visual annotations may be textual and/or non-textual, and may be presented in association with a cluster in response to various events. In some implementations, these additional annotations may be presented to a user (e.g., of AMS 107) when they somehow interact with cluster(s), such as by clicking on an individual agricultural field within a cluster (or clicking anywhere in a cluster in some cases), operating a pointing device such as a mouse to hover a graphical element such as a cursor over an individual field of a cluster (or over the cluster as a whole), etc. The additional visual annotation may be presented in various locations, such as in a pop-up window (e.g., over viewer 240 or elsewhere on the GUI), on a separate portion of the GUI from an overhead view, as text the overlays an overhead view of agricultural fields, etc.
In some implementations, the additional visual annotation that is presented for a given cluster of agricultural fields may take the form of a histogram of agricultural features. Histograms may be generated for individual features and/or groups of features, such as principal components determined by preprocessing module 124. Additionally, in some implementations, histograms may be generated that compare/contrast different agricultural features and/or compare agricultural features of one cluster to agricultural fields of one or more other clusters, or even to all agricultural fields in a geographic area.
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Another type of additional visual annotation that may be generated, e.g., by AMS 107 and/or UI module 130, is based on a decision tree. In some implementations, partition module 128 may be configured to partition a plurality of agricultural fields not only into clusters, but into a hierarchy of clusters. In some such implementations, AMS 107 and/or UI module 130 may fit a decision tree to the hierarchy of clusters. The additional visual annotation for a given cluster may then be generated based on a path through the decision tree.
The top node 650A in
Top node 650A has two children nodes, 650B and 650C. These children nodes represent clusters that are somewhat more granular than the fields represented by top node 650A. Child node 650B represents a cluster of 2591 samples (fields) that satisfy the criterion of the parent node, (top node 650A), and hence, have VP values that are less than or equal to 0.353. Given the large sample size (2591), child node 650B still has a relatively large GINI coefficient of 0.938. The remaining 545 fields (2591+545=3136) are represented by child node 650C, with each field having a vapor pressure (VP) that is greater than 0.353. The number of samples in the cluster represented by child node 650C is significantly smaller than the clusters represented by nodes 650A or 650B. Consequently, the GINI coefficient of child node 650C is smaller, 0.533, indicating less variance than the other two clusters.
Each node in
The feature vector of child node 650C is called out in the dashed box 652 for illustrative purposes. This feature vector includes a variety of different features value ranges/thresholds, including: an elevation upper threshold, a Palmer drought severity index (PDSI) lower threshold, a distance to water upper threshold, an accumulated precipitation (prec_acc) upper threshold, a soil moisture lower threshold, a minimum temperature lower threshold, snow water equivalent (SWE) upper threshold, a distance to water lower threshold, a maximum temperature upper threshold, a sand fraction upper threshold, a runoff upper threshold, a VP upper threshold, and a minimum temperature upper threshold. These feature thresholds are provided as examples only, and should not be construed as limiting in any way.
Nodes farther down the hierarchy of decision tree 600 have lower GINI values because they represent more granular clusters that include fewer agricultural fields each. For example, the child nodes 650D and 650E of node 650C represent clusters of 199 and 346 fields, respectively. While child node 650D has a GINI coefficient of 0.528 that is only slightly lower than its parent node (0.533), child node 650E has a GINI coefficient of 0.056—a dramatic decrease from the parent node's GINI coefficient of 0.533.
As two more examples, child node 650D has two of its own child nodes, 650F and 650G. Child node 650F includes 79 samples and has a GINI coefficient of 0.312, somewhat less than the GINI coefficient of its parent node (0.528). The sibling node 650G has 120 samples and a GINI coefficient of 0.0, suggesting a minimal amount of variance between agricultural fields in the cluster represented by node 650G. In some implementations, nodes with GINI coefficients below a particular threshold may be leaf nodes and may not include additional children nodes, although this is not required.
In various implementations, the additional visual annotation described previously may be generated based on a path through decision tree 600. For example, in
Accordingly, in various implementations, ranges, thresholds, and/or other statistical data generated by traversing a path through decision tree 600 may be mapped to semantically-meaningful words or phrases in order to provide a more intuitive GUI for a user. In some cases these semantically-meaningful words or phrases may be similar to those used with traditional AEZs, such as “cold,” “temperate,” “hot,” “dry,” etc. While examples herein relate to providing an additional visual annotation based on a path through decision tree 600, this is not meant to be limiting. In other implementations, especially where semantic mapping is employed to create more intuitive annotations, audio feedback may be provided for a cluster of agricultural fields, e.g., when the user clicks or otherwise selects the cluster or one of its constituent fields. For example, text-to-speech processing may be performed to generate audio (e.g., natural language output) that describes characteristics shared amongst agricultural fields of a cluster, such as “These fields are temperate, have relatively low elevations, and never exceed 28° C.”
As noted previously, in various implementations, preprocessing module 124 may be configured to preprocess raw agricultural data from index 122 and store it in preprocessed data index 126.
At block 702, preprocessing module 124 may aggregate temporal features. Temporal features may include agricultural features that are measured/sampled multiple times over a time interval (e.g., a crop cycle), and thus may be expressed as time-series data. Temporal features may include, for instance, temperature, precipitation, soil moisture, wind, sunlight, etc. To the extent various temporal features are sampled at different rates (e.g., daily versus weekly versus hourly), at block 704, preprocessing module 124 may impute missing values. For example, a mean of two temporal values may be computed to fill in a gap between those two temporal values. Alternatively, a low frequency temporal value (e.g., weekly rainfall) may be replicated enough times to correspond with higher frequency temporal values, such as daily sunlight.
At block 706, preprocessing module 124 may normalize various agricultural features so that they are at the same scale. At block 708, preprocessing module 124 may selectively apply weights to some agricultural features in order to ensure that relatively sparse features are sufficiently considered. For example, there may be dozens of different climatic features available but a relatively small (or sparse) number of edaphic features, and yet the sparse edaphic features may be just as influential as the climatic features in determining how to manage a field. Accordingly, the relatively sparse edaphic features may be weighted relatively heavily compared to the climatic feature(s).
Then, at block 710, preprocessing module 124 may apply principal component analysis (PCA) to extract some number of principal components that account for the bulk of variance between agricultural fields. In some implementations, preprocessing module 124 may extract fifteen principal components that represent a high level (e.g., ˜98%) of the variance among the agricultural fields under consideration, but this is not meant to be limiting. Each principal component may include a single agricultural feature, or may be a combination of multiple different agricultural features. Moreover, other techniques for dimension reduction are also contemplated, in addition to or instead of PCA.
At block 802, the system, e.g., by way of UI module 130, may render (or cause to be rendered), as part of a GUI such as that depicted in
At block 804, the system may receive user input that indicates a second granularity value that is different from the first granularity value. For example, a user may operate adjustment element 242 to select a different K-value to be employed in K-means or K-median clustering. Based on the second granularity value and the agricultural features, at block 806, the system, e.g., by way of partition module 128, may partition the plurality of agricultural fields into a second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields. In various implementations, a count of the second set of clusters may be different than a count of the first set of clusters as a result of the change to the granularity value.
At block 806, the system, e.g., by way of UI module 130, may render (or cause to be rendered), as part of the GUI, an updated map of the geographic area in which the plurality of agricultural fields are visually annotated on an individual agricultural field-basis to convey the second set of clusters of similar agricultural fields. At block 808, the system, e.g., by way of UI module 130, may generate an additional visual annotation for a given cluster of the second set of clusters. In various implementations, each cluster of the second set of clusters may be interactive (e.g., by clicking on or hovering over a field of the cluster, speaking an identifier associated with the cluster, etc.) to present an additional annotation about agricultural features shared among agricultural fields of the cluster. As noted previously and illustrated in
User interface input devices 922 may include a keyboard, pointing devices such as a mouse, trackball, touchpad, or graphics tablet, a scanner, a touch screen incorporated into the display, audio input devices such as voice recognition systems, microphones, and/or other types of input devices. In some implementations in which computing device 910 takes the form of a HMD or smart glasses, a pose of a user's eyes may be tracked for use, e.g., alone or in combination with other stimuli (e.g., blinking, pressing a button, etc.), as user input. In general, use of the term “input device” is intended to include all possible types of devices and ways to input information into computing device 910 or onto a communication network.
User interface output devices 920 may include a display subsystem, a printer, a fax machine, or non-visual displays such as audio output devices. The display subsystem may include a cathode ray tube (CRT), a flat-panel device such as a liquid crystal display (LCD), a projection device, one or more displays forming part of a HMD, or some other mechanism for creating a visible image. The display subsystem may also provide non-visual display such as via audio output devices. In general, use of the term “output device” is intended to include all possible types of devices and ways to output information from computing device 910 to the user or to another machine or computing device.
Storage subsystem 924 stores programming and data constructs that provide the functionality of some or all of the modules described herein. For example, the storage subsystem 924 may include the logic to perform selected aspects of method 800 described herein, as well as to implement various elements depicted in
These software modules are generally executed by processor 914 alone or in combination with other processors. Memory 925 used in the storage subsystem 924 can include a number of memories including a main random access memory (RAM) 930 for storage of instructions and data during program execution and a read only memory (ROM) 932 in which fixed instructions are stored. A file storage subsystem 926 can provide persistent storage for program and data files, and may include a hard disk drive, a floppy disk drive along with associated removable media, a CD-ROM drive, an optical drive, or removable media cartridges. The modules implementing the functionality of certain implementations may be stored by file storage subsystem 926 in the storage subsystem 924, or in other machines accessible by the processor(s) 914.
Bus subsystem 912 provides a mechanism for letting the various components and subsystems of computing device 910 communicate with each other as intended. Although bus subsystem 912 is shown schematically as a single bus, alternative implementations of the bus subsystem may use multiple busses.
Computing device 910 can be of varying types including a workstation, server, computing cluster, blade server, server farm, or any other data processing system or computing device. Due to the ever-changing nature of computers and networks, the description of computing device 910 depicted in
While several implementations have been described and illustrated herein, a variety of other means and/or structures for performing the function and/or obtaining the results and/or one or more of the advantages described herein may be utilized, and each of such variations and/or modifications is deemed to be within the scope of the implementations described herein. More generally, all parameters, dimensions, materials, and configurations described herein are meant to be exemplary and that the actual parameters, dimensions, materials, and/or configurations will depend upon the specific application or applications for which the teachings is/are used. Those skilled in the art will recognize, or be able to ascertain using no more than routine experimentation, many equivalents to the specific implementations described herein. It is, therefore, to be understood that the foregoing implementations are presented by way of example only and that, within the scope of the appended claims and equivalents thereto, implementations may be practiced otherwise than as specifically described and claimed. Implementations of the present disclosure are directed to each individual feature, system, article, material, kit, and/or method described herein. In addition, any combination of two or more such features, systems, articles, materials, kits, and/or methods, if such features, systems, articles, materials, kits, and/or methods are not mutually inconsistent, is included within the scope of the present disclosure.
Guo, Cheng-en, Grant, Elliott, Zheng, Ming, Clifford, David, Wang, Nanzhu, Deis, Aleksandra
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